Well to START with, you kind of have to be a big Whedon fan in the first place (which it sounds like the OP probably isn't). You have to like his style of dialogue, the way he writes his characters, etc.

And even then, it still took 3 or 4 episodes for the show to really click with me.

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Well, I wasn't. Firefly was my first real exposure to Joss Whedon. I've since come to enjoy most of his stuff, though.

Firefly is chock full of quotability. Oddly, though, one of the most memorable exchanges is one which doesn't get pulled out all that often:

Mal: "Cattle on the ship three weeks, she don't go near 'em. Now we're on Jiangyin and suddenly she's got a drivin' need to commune with the beasts."
River: "They weren't cows inside. They were waiting to be but they forgot. Now they see sky and they remember what they are."
Mal: "Is it bad that what she said made perfect sense to me?"

I thought it was an okay show and would have kept watching if it had stayed on . . . but I think the reverence that some of the fans have for this show causes a lot of people to be disappointed when they finally see it. It's not as good as they make it out to be, in part, because it didn't last long enough.

Part of that reaction is also due to the existence of Serenity the movie.

Most of what got people riled about the cancellation was that incredible sense of unfulfilled potential. Given that, we all watched the show about a dozen times in order to pull out every nuance.

But with the movie being a part of the viewing experience now.....it actually has an ending. Maybe not a complete ending, but something. I think that tends to dull the fanaticism of new viewers, just as it's calmed those of us who were there from the start.

I thought it was an okay show and would have kept watching if it had stayed on . . . but I think the reverence that some of the fans have for this show causes a lot of people to be disappointed when they finally see it. It's not as good as they make it out to be, in part, because it didn't last long enough.

Very possible. The fact that the story doesn't seem to be going anywhere troubles me. For all its faults, Voyager had a clear, fundamental purpose, and so did Enterprise, though to a lesser extent.

I gave Smallville a try because we were promised a journey to Supermanhood, and Carnivàle set up a confrontation in its first episode that it built steadily towards with each passing ep. Firefly, on the other hand, has no discernible purpose. There's no vague mission of exploration and peace as in Trek;

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There's a line (from the pilot I think) that applies here: Sheppard Book says: "The destination's not so important, it's how you get there that's the worthier part..."

Joss explicitly set out to make Firefly different in that regard. The "purpose" is oft summed up by Browncoats as "get a ship, find a job, keep flying". He didn't want some grand theme (noble explorers, valiant law enforcers, et al) to drive the show.

Firefly is about people, and "everyday" people at that. Who they are. What circumstances made them to be where they are. And these particular people are far from "the best of the best"; they're "just folk", like us. Putting one foot in front of the other just to make it through the crisis of the day.

The other great thing about the show is Joss' ready command of writing really good dialogue. It's not stuffily formal like Trek or Galactica.

One ep I haven't seen reccomended (yet) is "Our Mrs. Reynolds". GREAT fun, if not quite a "plot advancer" like you seem to be looking for.

Here's one of my favourite bits of dialogue from Serenty (the ep):
Simon: I'm trying to put this as delicately as I can... How do I know you won't kill me in my sleep?
Mal: You don't know me, son, so let me explain this to you once: If I ever kill you, you'll be awake. You'll be facing me, and you'll be armed.
Simon: Are you always this sentimental?
Mal: I had a good day.
Simon: You had the Alliance on you, criminals and savages... Half the people on the ship have been shot or wounded including yourself, and you're harboring known fugitives.
Mal: Well, we're still flying.
Simon: That's not much.
Mal: It's enough.

Yeah, there really isn't any fundamental purpose of the show. The characters aren't really striving towards a goal. It's basically a show about a dysfunctional family flying around in space trying to survive in a universe that doesn't really want them around...

The fact that the story doesn't seem to be going anywhere troubles me. For all its faults, Voyager had a clear, fundamental purpose, and so did Enterprise, though to a lesser extent...

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Why is this necessary?
Has every TV show in history "gone somewhere"? I presume you're referring to a story arc. Those are a fairly recent development in prime time TV drama. Not that I have anything against arcs, but TV dramas did just fine as episodic adventure-of-the-week shows for decades.

Yeah, there really isn't any fundamental purpose of the show. The characters aren't really striving towards a goal. It's basically a show about a dysfunctional family flying around in space trying to survive in a universe that doesn't really want them around...

Yeah, there really isn't any fundamental purpose of the show. The characters aren't really striving towards a goal. It's basically a show about a dysfunctional family flying around in space trying to survive in a universe that doesn't really want them around...